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24 October, 2012

Pocketmod Playbook Tactics

In the pocketmod, there is a front page, a back page and three double page spreads in the middle of the booklet. This offers some great opportunities for formatting...stuff that you just don't get when you're stuck with a single page.

Here's an idea I had for formatting the centre double page spreads...

It's based off an idea I've been toying with for a while...a way to speed up combat while giving it a strategic edge.

The first double page spread would probably have some flavour text about the character type, the middle and last double page spreads would provide a range of abilities (some of which might be granted automatically, others bought with XP).

The fun bit is the formatting in the top and bottom margins.

Whether you hold the page right way up, or upside down, there is a defence matrix on the left and an attack matrix on the right. With three double page spreads, you get six different combat strategies you could use.

For example...

This might be pretty typical of an adventurer. A seasoned warrior might have more points filled in, a magic user might have less (but this is offset by access to interesting spells), an exotic traveller from a far off land might have a very different range of points filled in to reflect their unusual combat style.

With these points filled in, a combat would work by simply picking a page border that matches your character's combat tactic for the round. Your opponent does likewise.

Then you simply line up the booklets and see if any of your attacks made it through to hit the opponent.

For example, the top character here has taken a "balanced stance", while the bottom character has gone "defensive low". Each character has an attack point that has not been matched by a defense point. Each applies damage to their opponent.

As another example, when two characters take a "balanced stance" their actions are deadlocked with every attack point matched by a defence point. There are no opportunities to apply damage.

If both character's had engaged a "low defensive" tactic, they'd also find that no attacks got through.

I haven't gotten much further beyond the basic concepts yet. I haven't decided how damage might be applied (but I'm thinking about something simple like paperclips on the edge of the pocketmod to highlight certain character states...injured, dazed, cursed, etc.), and I haven't worked out a good coherent system to tie all of this into.

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